Isagi was eating. And eating. And eating.
Dragon-Radiance Vitality Pills, Augmented Ginseng Vigor Pills, Ascension Powder, Featherlight Powder, Jewel-Convergence Tiger-Subduing Pills, Bone-Fortifying Medicine, Calamity-Warding Medicine, Cooling Powder, Seven-Cycle Fire Elixir, Life-Preservation Pills, Mirror Pills — and the stuff of legend, the supreme elixir said to bring a person back from the brink of death itself: the Nine-Cycle Soul-Returning Pill.
All of these, of course, had been concocted by Isagi using the character card «Journey to the West, Revisited».
But unlike the «Celestial Elixirs» that permanently boosted stats, these «Mortal Elixirs» were temporary — a chaotic jumble of buffs to attack, defense, stamina, the five senses, and all manner of other attributes.
The upside was that they didn't require the exquisite Core Elixirs that only dropped from elite monsters and bosses. The raw materials were nothing more than common herbs and dungeon-floor crafting ingredients.
And so, over time, Isagi had fallen into a habit: brew a batch whenever he had a spare moment, then let them pile up since there was never a good opportunity to use them.
Until now.
Right now was exactly the moment they were made for.
Within the roaring torrent of fire, Isagi's body blazed with dazzling light — red, blue, green, orange, white — a riot of colors tangled and woven together, so overwhelming it gave the impression of something dizzying and surreal.
'?!'
His aura had shifted again.
Zard could feel it clearly: in an instant, the boy before him had grown enormously, tremendously stronger — and yet, however you looked at it, he was still only Lv. 5.
The gap between adventurer levels was, at its core, the gap between the very vessels that contained their power. A teacup and a great water barrel — an incomparable difference, however you tried to measure it.
And yet.
It was as though some fundamental concept had been shattered entirely.
The swirling, iridescent colors pouring from Isagi's body had become something that none of the gods of this world could begin to comprehend — the power of an Immortal Sage.
Ah —
Erebus, standing nearby, and the old man somewhere deep within the distant farmstead, both let out small sounds of astonishment. It was the first time either of them had seen the power of a god manifesting within one of the children of the lower world.
And on top of that — it wasn't the power of any god either of them recognized.
Wait — no!
On the road here, Erebus had already witnessed it — the golden wings the boy had unfurled. But that [Golden] radiance then was entirely different from the overwhelming, primordial presence he felt now: a force that seemed to have existed since the very birth of heaven and earth.
He had the power of a god — fine. But how did he also have the power of a completely different god?!
Incomprehensible. Even framing it as «the limitless potential of the lower world's children» felt like a wild stretch.
Zard, however, had no time for any of that.
He simply felt more excited than ever.
Good.
"Then push harder from here — you can take it, can't you?!"
The flames surged anew.
And the only answer Zard received was the boy's club of dark-crimson flesh and muscle — suddenly, grotesquely, impossibly thicker than before.
In combat — especially boss fights — Isagi rarely used the «Journey to the West, Revisited» character card, and the reason was simple: the [Spell] abilities it granted were frustratingly ineffective against strong opponents, particularly in cross-tier battles.
Whether it was the Paralysis Seal, the Body-Double technique, or the Grounding Technique — against truly powerful foes, every one of them was severely limited in effect.
The Bronze Head Iron Arms buff, which actually did work, was largely redundant given that he already had the All-Bones Blade for perfect blocking — they weren't identical, but the difference was marginal at best.
The one ability that stood out was probably Gather-and-Scatter Qi.
It could throw him into stealth in an instant, followed by a single powerful «Break-Concealment Strike» — extremely useful against tenacious enemies, especially those with strong ranged capabilities.
But it wasn't suited for the situation at hand.
The sea of fire Zard had spewed was too vast, too all-consuming — there was simply no space to maneuver. And besides, a warrior of Zard's experience facing an enemy who could vanish from sight would simply wait it out, responding to nothing and everything at once.
But there was one other ability — an extremely powerful spell.
The [Forbidden Word Seal].
At the cost of being unable to use any magic, spells, or transformation-type «Spirit Form» abilities, it granted a sweeping, massive boost to every single one of his stats.
"Forbidden!"
A deep crimson character blazed out from within Isagi's body, coalescing in the air before his face before dissolving into surging waves of qi that wrapped around his hands and feet like hinges snapping into place.
And in that very instant, Isagi's aura erupted once again — so powerfully that even Zard felt a jolt of genuine, delighted surprise.
This was stacking!
What were his total stats right now?
3,000? 4,000? Even 5,000?
No one could say for certain. But what was beyond doubt was that the club of flesh and blood in his hands swept across like an impossibly massive stone pillar — and actually drove the enormous Zard back several meters.
Even the blazing inferno around them was snuffed out in great patches by the howling gale of that swing.
"Magnificent!"
The boy in front of him could no longer be measured by the yardstick of «Lv. 5»!
Then he, too, would show a little more of what he was truly capable of!!
Zard's body began to emit an unceasing, agonized moan — searing pain crawling into every corner of his frame, as if each drop of blood were crying out in torment. But even so, the man who had once been — no, who still was — the world's greatest adventurer crushed it all down by sheer force of will.
Then, he swung.
In an instant, the club of flesh and muscle in Isagi's hands melted away.
The enormous sword sheathed in scarlet flame cut clean through it, the wound as smooth as if the flesh were butter — and the crimson mass of meat crashed heavily to the ground.
[#!]
His equipment couldn't keep up with the intensity of the fight!!
The flesh-and-blood club had been forged from the special materials dropped by a boss he had cleared in the Dungeon's upper floors — and though he had applied the [Mystery] development ability to it, at the end of the day, it was still nothing more than drops from a boss of roughly Lv. 4 caliber.
The equipment forged from it obviously couldn't match the standard of first-tier armaments.
As for the great sword in Zard's hands — it was the jet-black blade he had once used to slay the [Land King], his favorite weapon: heavy, brutal, the deep crimson banner wound around its hilt blazing like flowing fire, bearing the crest of Zeus Familia.
He had originally intended to leave it behind in that pitch-black desert — the Dead Ash Desert, an absolute forbidden zone on the continent, the land smothered in the poison and cinders left behind by the Behemoth's death. Nothing could grow there. Even adventurers dared not set foot in it lightly.
He had planned to bury the sword that slew the [Land King] in that place — just as he himself should already have died the moment he struck that killing blow.
If Zard had said yes to Erebus, he would have done exactly that.
But there was no longer any need.
To treat the boy before him as the final dance between himself and his old partner — that seemed like a rather fitting choice, all things considered.
The flames raged wildly.
As if to burn the very horizon to ash — the flesh-and-blood club in Isagi's hands, after clashing with Zard's blade again and again, finally failed to hold on, and melted away completely.
What followed was the Thunder Hammer. Then the great bow. Then the twin swords.
Only two weapons could truly hold against the great blade in Zard's grip: the All-Bones Blade, now upgraded to Lv. 3 with room still to grow — and the Moonlight Greatsword that came as part of the [Wolf's Devouring Feast] set.
But even those were barely managing.
The disparity in equipment was glaringly, painfully apparent in this moment.
There was nothing to be done about it.
Because Zard was too strong — the strongest opponent Isagi had ever faced — perhaps rivaling the [Incarnation of the Dungeon] back then? Maybe not quite.
It was hard to say.
The Dungeon, at that time, hadn't been fighting at full strength.
But the Zard before him now was different — he was giving everything he had. It was both the respect a warrior afforded an opponent worthy of it, and the «Trial» that Isagi absolutely had to overcome!
That said — however grand the sentiment — every weapon he possessed would fail to survive even a minute inside this blazing inferno.
Isagi hadn't expected things to come to this!
"Not enough, not enough, not enough! Boy!! If that's all you've got, it won't satisfy me!!"
The jet-black greatsword crashing down was like a volcano erupting in fury.
The pulsing scarlet flames had long since turned the ground beneath their feet into flowing magite.
Every now and then, a fireball would erupt and detonate from within it without warning.
What in the world kind of magic was this?!
Clang!
Clang!
Clang!
After a series of perfect blocks, the All-Bones Blade too began to let out a moan of protest — it had clearly reached its limit.
Isagi poured all the energy he had stockpiled into a burst of golden blade-light and sent it slashing out, driving Zard back.
Then — he drew the last weapon he had left, the famed blade «Tsukikakushi».
In one single motion, he channeled every drop of mana he had directly into it.
Combined with his current, extraordinarily inflated stats — boosted by the elixirs and the Forbidden Word Seal — the blade blazed to life.
It wasn't a Skill activation, and it wasn't a battle technique read from his Magic — which meant it could be used under the Forbidden Word Seal's restrictions.
Azure mana roared and surged, so overwhelming in scale that it swept up the surrounding flames entirely in its wake.
That too was mana — and so it was influenced, transformed, every tongue of fire turning into an azure «star», gathering and converging like a blade, ultimately becoming a towering pillar of luminous edge-light that split the sky.
"Crescent Moon Sky-Cleave!"
Isagi shouted it on a whim.
The azure radiance flooded over Zard completely in an instant.
"Ha ha ha ha ha ha!"
The man was still laughing.
And at that same moment, from the distant farmstead behind him, came the crystalline, utterly composed chanting of a woman's voice.
"Peace of the soul."
A supremely short-form enchantment magic — and in an instant, it enveloped the entire area around the farmstead.
Invisible mana spread outward.
And the pure blade of concentrated mana that Isagi had gathered and unleashed simply… vanished, dissolved into nothing.
This was the Domain that Alfia herself had deployed — a field that rendered all magic completely void: [Garden of Silence].
"Interesting."
The light faded.
The autumn night returned to its earlier stillness, as though nothing had ever disturbed it.
The wildfire that had been spreading endlessly was gone — utterly, completely gone — as if it had never existed at all, leaving behind only indescribable char-black scorch marks.
The ground beneath their feet had been reduced entirely to jet-black cinder, radiating a stench that defied easy description.
Zard raised his jet-black greatsword once more.
He still had not fought at full strength.
That was a power his body — already past its limit — could only unleash one final time: the power he had gained after devouring the flesh of the [Land King] following the Behemoth's defeat.
Zard's body had been completely ravaged by the Behemoth's lethal poison, which was why he had not participated in the subsequent battle against the [Black Dragon]. And perversely, it was that absence which had allowed him to survive.
But his body had long since been worn to ruin, riddled with wounds, barely holding itself together through sheer stubbornness.
Both he and Alfia were running out of time.
And so — if he were to «fight at full strength», he would burn away the very last ember of his life force in doing so.
But the moment had not yet come, because the timing was not right.
Isagi too held a great sword — the Moonlight Greatsword of the [Wolf's Devouring Feast] set, now on the verge of shattering. The [Wolf's Devouring Feast] itself was a first-tier armament, but the Moonlight Greatsword was merely a «bonus component» — a part of the armor set rather than its core. After fighting this long, it had genuinely reached its limit.
"Disappointing."
Zard muttered flatly, looking at Isagi, then asked, "Do you have any other weapons?"
"You'll have to wait for next time."
"Then next time it is."
The supreme adventurer withdrew his weapon. Striking an enemy who had no weapon left in hand was beneath him.
More than that — as if he had already foreseen how this would all end, Zard wanted a death that was perfect and magnificent above all else.
"I'll be waiting."
With those words, the man turned and walked away.
And Isagi stood there, gazing at the scattered wreckage of shattered weapons around him, and let out a small, somewhat forlorn sigh.
In the end — he simply hadn't prepared enough.
____
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